MTZ girls soccer improves to 7-1

By BLAKE FAITH
Staff Writer

The Mt. Zion Braves picked up two wins last week against Monticello and an early season rematch against Pana. Braves’ teammates Maddie Kendall and Mackenzie Krieger secured hat tricks in the Pana game.

The Braves started their scoring against Pana in the 23rd minute. Sydney Howerton delivered a crossing pass to Kendall who netted the goal to make the score 1-0. Less than 40 seconds later, Krieger nailed her first goal of the night to make the score 2-0.

In the 25th minute, Krieger delivered a ball to Kendall who made her second goal of the night to make the score 3-0. Less than two minutes later, Krieger shot a shot that was saved, but came back out. Krieger gathered the rebound and fired the shot into the back of the net to make the score 4-0. Later in the half, Krieger rebounded another shot off the Pana goalkeeper and secured her hat trick with her third goal of the night to give the Braves a 5-0 lead to end the first half.

The Braves outshot Pana 14-0 in the first half with 10 of those shots being on-goal. In the second half, the Panthers shot three shots with two being on-goal that Braves’ goalkeeper Denver Andersobn turned into saves. Late in the second half, the Braves scored another goal with Kendall netting a goal and securing her hat trick giving the Braves a 6-0 win.

“We knew it was going to be a tale of two halves with the strong wind going with us in the first half going into it in the second half,” Head coach Jonathon Moore said. “So we made just a slight adjustment in that first half to add another person up top. And Mackenzie Krieger is always playing in the back and came up top and she ended up scoring three goals. So we definitely want to take advantage of that when we have it.”

Against Monticello, the Braves won 3-2. Ther Braves are now 7-1 on the season and will face Mahomet-Seymour, Taylorville and Warrrensburg-Latham next week.

“We know that Mahomet is gonna be a good test,” Coach Moore said. “So we’ll get a handful of practices and before we see them, where we keep ourselves fresh as much as we can we get as many touches as we can and kind of clean up you know, some areas that have been of concern.”